Step Nine
by CeCe Away
Summary: Tag to 6.11 Appointment in Samarra and 6.12 Like a Virgin. "Come on, man. You're scaring me." Dean was practically holding him off the wet ground now.
1. Chapter 1

**Tag to 6.11 Appointment in Samarra**

**Same ol disclaimer: Nada for me**

**Step Nine**

Leaning against the Impala, Dean watched Sam walk across the street to the little gas station, his tall frame silhouetted by the street lamp overhead, which seemed to circle Sam like a spotlight. Sam hesitated there. Dean shifted, ready to go with him, even though Sam insisted he needed to do this on his own.

Three months and three days, they'd been on this damn conscience clearing quest. Not exactly true, two weeks of that had been at Bobby's with Sam dogging the old hunter's every step. _Sorry, I'm so sorry. Sorry I was going to kill you._ Even though his chest was sore, scorched from having his soul driven unwillingly through his flesh, Sam worked himself to the bone as some sort of restitution. He scoured every pot, fixed a squeaky step, ran every errand, built Bobby new book shelves, a new shed, dug a shallow trench around the entire salvage yard, which he filled in with salt and cement.

Kid was exhausted. Like scrubbing a toilet could make up for almost stabbing a knife into their surrogate father's heart.

And Bobby had had enough. The onslaught of the man's breakdown terrified Dean. He'd never seen the old hunter's defenses so thoroughly breached. Tears wet Bobby's devastated features as the weathered hands locked around Sam's arms with a ferocity that shocked both brothers.

"Not another _sorry_. Not another gaddamned apology. I can't take it. I swear, boy, you are killing me."

Sam flinched. Dean flinched. Poor choice of words. "But Bob—"

"I mean it, boy. Working yourself to the nubs won't make it right."

Sam's gaze lowered to the floor. He nodded. His voice was a tight whisper. "I know." A little curl of pain flickered inside Dean's belly.

"Damnit, Sam." Bobby's hands moved to Sam's cheeks, forcing the young man to look at him. "That's not what I mean. You listen, you listen good. There's nothing you can do to make it go away. It happened. No going back. So we deal with it."

"I was going to kill you." Sam's chin quivered.

"Hell bent on it," Bobby roared. Dean remained very still. All of their _it wasn't you, you had no soul, you're not responsible for what Robo Sam did_ pleas hadn't dented the armor of Sam's guilt. Maybe Bobby's tough love could finally get through.

"You're like a recovering alcoholic, trying to make amends to people who don't want to relive it. Step Nine, Sam. You can't make everything right when doing so would injure them or others. This," Bobby's hands left Sam to sweep through the air. "This, what you're doing, is hurting me. I want you to leave."

Sam's shoulders sagged inward, seeming to lose a good inch of his height. "I . . ." Whatever he wanted to say clogged in his throat. As much as Dean had missed the constant emotions that flickered across his brother's face in any given moment, this one, this sad destroyed look hurt.

Bobby turned his back on Sam, his features collapsing now that the younger man couldn't see him. "Just go. Go hunt something."

Eyes glistening, Sam nodded and headed sluggishly for the stairs.

Dean waited until he heard the tread of footsteps overhead and then slipped his palm over Bobby's shoulder. As though it was an anchor, Bobby's own hand slid over it. Head bowed, Bobby looked like he'd just gone ten rounds with a battering ram.

Dean gave the shoulder a squeeze. "You sure about this?"

"No." Bobby's voice was gruff. "But he needs to work through this. And being here, around me, reminded of what he almost . . . that isn't helping. Just go, get him out there hunting again, and Dean . . . you look out for that boy."

Dean smiled because they both knew that was the one thing he didn't need to be reminded to do. "Sure you don't want us sticking around for a few more days? Might get a new porch out of it."

Bobby's lips finally hitched up. "Idjit."

They hadn't been back to Bobby's. Though Dean called him periodically. What they had done was take on every hunt they could find while at the same time Sam dragged Dean across the country, looking up everyone he had wronged during the period without his soul. Not that Dean was against it, because focusing on making things right occupied him from scratching at Death's wall. Facing the things Sam's body had done topside couldn't begin to compare to what his soul had experienced down under.

But . . . Dean wasn't sure this was helping Sam. It seemed to just be crushing him further down into himself, making him close up. Those soulful hurt eyes would barely look Dean straight in the eye anymore though he felt Sam studying him often, turning quickly away whenever Dean looked back at him. And sometimes, although Dean didn't want him to, he really didn't want to have that conversation, he couldn't help wondering why Sam hadn't come to him, his own brother, with an apology of sorts. Not that he wanted the kid to beat himself up over it or even remember what had happened between them. Maybe he didn't. Or maybe it was just too big, too overpowering to think about the vampires. Maybe it wasn't big enough. After all, Dean had been cured. But still . . . it hurt. Just a little.

Of course before leaving for another make-things-right session, Dean dragged out of Sam each detail. He wasn't stupid enough to let Sam walk up to an angry grieving father with a shotgun or bar full of a vengeful coven no matter how guilty Sam felt. Some things weren't worth it and other things couldn't be put to rights. So far Dean had put his foot down on three of them, realizing nothing would come of it, but Sam being hurt. For the most part, the _innocents_ Sam claimed he'd killed, weren't all that innocent. They'd made their own blunders into the supernatural, summoning ghosts or playing with witchcraft and instead of leading them out of harm's way, No Soul Sam had simply let their stupidity play out.

Except this one. The last person on the list. Dean shifted against the Impala. Sam still hadn't moved out from under the lamp post and it was starting to rain.

#

Sam felt frozen in place. He remembered this little mom and pop gas station, the couple who owned it, all the details of what he'd allowed to happen, yet it was all surreal as well, like watching memories scroll across a screen, seeing them through the character's eyes, yet not feeling it, not physically. He could not recall how the werewolf's fur felt on his hand or the whoosh and smell of rancid breath in his face when he shoved the silver blade into the stomach. Couldn't even feel the hilt for that matter. Because he hadn't really been there, not really. His brain simply registered it as fact.

It was all so strange. He remembered his thoughts, weighing options, deciding on the most favorable advantage to lure the beast in, the calculated risk of letting the mother, the wife, desperately believe the foolish notion that her daughter could be saved, turned back somehow if she called for the werewolf, scattered her scent around the woods . . .

Why would he let a mother believe that? The pain of thinking he could cure Madison when he couldn't was a constant pain in his gut. He didn't understand how he could have let that mother go through the torture of having that same hope heightened and then ripped away. Or why he'd just stood there and nodded without a single thought drifting back to the first woman he had been with since Jessica and then shot.

Jessica.

Rain drizzled onto his face, fat drops, velvet soft like blood dripping from the ceiling.

Sam lifted his palm, let the rain fall on it, crimson silk. He jerked back. Blood splattered from the sky, splashed on the asphalt where the red liquid sluiced into cracks where gnarled withered hands lifted out of the pavement like daisies thirsting for the sun.

Hell. Hell had found him. No, no, he hadn't scratched at the wall. Dean had explained the danger in that, even though it loomed like a giant writhing mass. He'd kept his distance, focused on hunting, on making amends. Blood splashed all over the limbs rising from the ground, coating fingers and arms.

"Sam!"

Dean spun him around and for a moment the world tilted, shifted beneath Sam's feet. When it righted there was only rain, only pavement. Only Dean.

He quickly looked away from his brother's worried gaze. Too intense. Too Dean. He couldn't meet it, not when all he saw was that damn vamp's blood pouring into Dean's mouth while he just stood there and let it happen, realizing this was a perfect opportunity. _No!_ _No_. Sam slammed those thoughts away, hastily constructing precarious walls of his own, which kept tumbling every friggin time he looked at his brother.

He realized he was breathing heavily. Hell coming for him and now Dean . . . and Sam couldn't keep his emotions controlled, couldn't just look away, pretending he didn't remember. He couldn't make it stop, not this time.

"Sam, what is it? This is a tough one, I know." Dean was giving him the perfect out. The girl, the werewolf. Dean thought he was freaked out over that. Well, he was, but . . . _God, Dean_. He'd let Dean get turned. He'd let him run off to Lisa's, nearly got her and Ben killed . . . ruined Dean's apple pie existence without a thought. Sam's throat was closing up.

"Come on, man. You're scaring me." Dean was practically holding him off the wet ground now. "We don't have to do this tonight."

It wasn't the right out, but it was an out so Sam took it. "Yeah, okay."

"Okay?" He felt Dean's gaze pouring over him though Sam was too ashamed to return it. "Okay, good. This . . ." Dean glanced back at the gas station. "This will still be here tomorrow if you want it."

"I want it," Sam choked out. He had to do this. Had to do what he could even though it wouldn't ever matter, wouldn't ever bring a girl back or her mother who only wanted to save her.

With one final look at the road, making sure there weren't any hands reaching out to grasp him and pull him under, Sam let Dean guide him back to the car.

TBC

Step 9 of the 12 Step Program of Alcoholics Anonymous.

**9. ****Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

Sam trudged into the motel room, feeling miserable, a failure. Everything he was doing was useless. He wasn't helping anybody. Bobby was right, he was just bringing more anguish to people he'd already hurt.

"Oh you have freakin got to be kidding me." Dean dropped his duffle at the threshold with a dissatisfied thunk, looking around the room Sam hadn't bothered to glance up enough yet to see. Pink. The walls were Pepto Bismal pink. Fru-fru ruffled purple comforters. The little table by the lace covered window was made of some kind of clear bubbled acrylic with . . . were the chairs meant to look like high heels?

Something unhinged inside Sam's chest, vibrating softly as it rose to the surface, a familiar current so long buried he'd forgotten it ever existed. Laughter. Simple laughter. He felt it quiver in his throat, slip past his lips in a quiet chuckle. He couldn't help it, the room was so ridiculous, Dean's features so pained over a color, Death's wall so fragile against the enormity of Hell and raindrops splattered like blood . . . _and God_, how could he be sure this wasn't another part of Hell seeping through the wall because he was certain, staying in this cartoon catastrophe of a room with Dean running an all night commentary of how Snow White and all seven dwarves must have thrown up all this shit had to be some sort of version of Hell, right?

"What kind of motel is this!" Dean stomped out of the room, glanced at the normal looking clapper-board exterior, then clomped back inside, arms shooting up in exasperation.

And Sam lost it. Laughter roared out of him like a meal coming up wrong.

His shoulders shook with it, stomach clenching and unclenching like a pump, and Dean . . . Dean's arms dropped. He stared at Sam the same way he'd done when he'd first come to get him at Stanford, when he thought Sam didn't notice, like he hadn't seen him in years, which Sam supposed was exactly right, exactly this. He'd been MIA, gone, left the building, and it skewered Sam's heart to see such a look on his older brother until Dean's face cracked, eyes crinkling at the corners as his mouth widened and the deep tenor of his older sibling's laugh curled around the garish room, warming the very air.

The rich tones sank inside Sam's skin, a salve drifting like a blanket to settle over his wounded soul and for a brief moment Sam was able to look at Dean and see his brother, grinning and laughing, not bent backwards under a snarly haired vampire's dripping wrist. He missed this. He missed Dean. _God,_ how he'd missed him.

So desperately that the tears already coating his eyes from laughing, now clogged in his throat while the hilarity of it all still warmed his chest, and tiny gasping hiccupping sounds wrestled between sadness and joy to see which would be the victor and spill out first.

His arms pressed against his stomach, trying to hold in the warmth, cling to it just a while longer when despair won out and Sam found himself sunk to his knees, shoulders lifting and dropping as they traveled the current of huge shattering sobs.

Dean was also on his knees, palms snaked around Sam's shoulders. Dean's arms rose and fell with Sam's harried breathing. He didn't say anything, just let Sam ride it through, rode it through with him, until the gasping ceased, breathing grew easier.

Swallowing tightly, Sam nodded, looking at the white carpet, the black compact fridge, anywhere but at Dean. "Do you . . . " he winced at the ragged sound of his voice, cleared his throat. "Do you want to change rooms?"

Dean squeezed Sam's arm. "Not for anything."

Sam gave a half smile at that and nodded. He gazed around the pink walls, lingered on the high heel chairs and felt a genuine smile settle at his lips. He was a complete mess, he knew that, but for the first time in months—hell, years, centuries even—he'd felt a tiny moment of peace.

#

Sam moved the poached eggs around on his plate.

"There's a possible hunt the next county over," Dean said around the last bite of his blueberry pancakes. "We could be there by this afternoon."

Sam's forehead furrowed. "I haven't gone back to that gas station yet."

"I know, but Sam . . ." Dean put his fork down. "This one's tearing you up. I can tell. Maybe it's one of those you need to just let be. 'Cause from where I'm sitting, it's too personal, too close to—"

"What happened to Madison?" Sam glanced up from his uneaten eggs. "Is that what you were going to say?"

Dean didn't back down. He never backed down. "Actually. Yeah. Yes."

The waitress came to refill their coffees, well Dean's coffee since Sam hadn't touched his yet. And her skin started curling away from her face in thin strips like a potato peeler was taken to her, revealing shiny bloodied bone beneath. All the other customers in the diner turned in their booths to stare at Sam, faces flaying away in various degrees of bleeding disrepair. In the booth across from them, a man's lips shredded away into stringy pieces. His teeth fell from torn gums onto the table. Click. Click. Click-click. Click.

"Can I get you anything else, hon?" The waitress was saying. Sam's gaze jerked back to her. Pretty little thing really, smooth unblemished skin. Whole. "Sir?"

"No," Sam whispered, eyes darting around the booths where diners were busily occupied with their own breakfasts. "Nothing for me. Thanks."

Brows lowered, Dean stared at him.

Sam looked down at his plate, feeling the heaviness of his brother studying him. Sam waited until the waitress had moved far enough away. "I need to do this."

Dean didn't say anything, forcing Sam to look up. His sibling's lips were pursed, brows colliding over worried eyes. Finally Dean sighed, eased up, leaned back against his bench. "Look. All I'm saying is give it some time. This one's killing you, man. We go the next county over, pop ourselves some ghost, then come right back. The guy will still be there and you'll have a little more time to sort out . . ." Dean waggled his fingers ". . . whatever it is you're afraid of saying to him. Besides, Sam, people in present danger supersedes anything else."

Sam looked away again. "Yeah, okay. Of course you're right. So what's the hunt?"

"Would you believe a bona-fide scalp-taking mountain man?"

TBC


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three **

Dean glanced sideways at his brother in the passenger seat, and pushed the worry that kept clawing its way up through his chest back down. Sam was fine. The kid was dealing and they both knew he had more than most to deal with. More than anyone on the planet, he'd say.

Taking this hunt had been a good idea. Giving Sam something else to focus on, something to erase those fearful moments when Dean would look over and see his brother not entirely with him, staring off into some nightmare, and please. . _._ please don't let it be the wall Sam was gazing at it.

But every time Sam came back to him on his own, his cloudy frightened eyes became clear again, so for now Dean let it be. He didn't want to accuse Sam of poking at the wall, especially when the kid promised he wouldn't. Look what accusations had done for them in the past? Driven Sam to do exactly what he didn't want him to do.

"Kay." Sam's voice startled him from his thoughts. Sam continued to stare at the map he'd been studying for the last hour. "I think I have this figured out."

A swell of pride rolled through Dean's gut. The Cage, Hell, being soulless and re-souled, the devil himself, couldn't ruin the intelligence of his brother's keen mind.

"Lay it on me, brother."

Sam's gaze snapped up, brows high. "You're in a good mood."

_You laughed yesterday_. "Chasing a mountain man. That makes me the Lone Ranger. What's not to be happy about?"

Chuckling, Sam rolled his eyes.

And Dean quieted, valuing the slight happy sound more than his sibling would ever know. He pushed for more. "That makes you Tonto."

"What? Does not."

"It totally does."

Sam huffed and the exasperated sound of it curled around Dean's senses. He just knew if he looked over now, he'd find the subtle beginnings of a bitchy expression.

"Fine." There it was, that annoyed voice and it took everything in Dean to not break down and weep. It'd been months—months—since he'd gotten Sam back, but the kid hadn't been fully back, too broken and guilt-ridden, a walking, breathing bag of sorrow. This—yesterday and now—this was the first real emergence of his little brother, and God he'd missed him.

"Tonto's cooler anyway. Better tracker. Better everything. And he has a better horse."

Dean pfffffed out a whistle of air. "Nobody's horse is better than Silver."

Sam only shook his head, grinning, and looked back at the map, signifying the argument was too stupid to bother continuing. Dean let it go because he was just so damn happy to have gotten Sam involved with the ridiculous conversation in the first place, and because there really wasn't any counter Sam could possibly come up with against the awesomeness of Silver anyway.

"So what'd you come up with?" Dean flicked his chin up while snapping his gaze toward the map.

Sam's features instantly lit up. "Okay, four scalped victims were found here, here, here and here." Sam's finger tapped each little X he had marked on the map.

"Kay. They're scattered throughout that area."

"Right." With his pencil Sam connected the X's, making a haphazard oval. "None of these four survived. All scalped."

"Yeah." Dean wasn't making a connection yet. "So?"

"So, there were two other victims—"

"Who are out purchasing wigs. They survived, Sammy. Is that what you're getting at, 'cause when we talked to each of them, there wasn't anything special they did or any type of connection with the spirit that allowed them to live while the other's died. Just dumb luck. Happens sometimes."

"Right. Except look. Matt started out here." Sam tapped a spot within his oval. "Kevin said he was in this area." He traced over a higher spot on the map, still within the oval. "But when they were found . . ."

"Those two both made it outside of your magic circle there."

Sam nodded.

"You think something's holding our scalper inside that limited area? That's why he couldn't finish Matt and Kevin off when they got out of it."

"I think if we want to find him, that's where we need to go."

They were quiet for a moment. Sam went back to studying the map.

After a while Dean thumped Sam's thigh. "Hey, Sammy."

"Yeah?"

"Good call."

Sam didn't say anything, just nodded, though from the corners of his eyes, Dean could see Sam's dimple deepen as his lip curved in a slight smile.

"But Silver is still the better horse."

#

The warmth of Dean's praise spread throughout Sam's chest. He shouldn't let it. He didn't deserve it, not after what he'd let happen to Dean, but he was selfish, he guessed, because he let the feeling drift through him, savoring it like a long forgotten secret just remembered.

They were only a few hours out from the wilderness area and there was still plenty of daylight. Already a working plan was formulating in his mind. They'd hike in, pitch a tent far outside of what Dean called the Magic Circle. Sam smiled. Then in the morning they'd scout around and try and find out how to gank the guy. Could be bones needing salt and fire, though the odds of finding an old trapper's remains weren't high. It could also be some sort of object the spirit was attached to. An axe, his scalping blade. Again the odds on finding that weren't the greatest. Then there was the mystery of whatever was holding the spirit to this one area. Maybe that was holding his spirit earthbound as well. Whatever it was, they'd have a better chance of figuring it out once they got in there.

And if the spirit manifested, that might give them an even better clue as to how to kill it. Just seeing a spirit, seeing what it had on him or what was missing sometimes offered the best solutions, like the Hookman's, well, hook, or that doll that murdering little girl from the painting dragged around with her.

All they really knew about the mountain man was that any hiker stumbling upon him, first got scalped, then if they didn't get out, had their throats slit.

Deep in thought, Sam looked up just as a headless corpse lobbed her decapitated skull at the windshield before the Impala plowed into her. Sucking in a huge gasp, Sam's fingers curled around the dashboard as the car bounced, then bounced again as tires rolled over her.

At Sam's gasp, Dean jerked the wheel. "Dude?" He began slowing the car, seeking a place to pull off. "Sam!"

Sam heard Dean, but he couldn't tear his gaze from the head slapping against the glass, blond strands of hair caught in the wiper blades.

"Sam!" Dean was shaking him, the car no longer moving, the head no longer bouncing.

Sam wrenched his gaze away from the head, from the gaping eye sockets, seeking Dean.

Dean stared at him, worry lines etched deep within the bridge of his nose. "What?"

Afraid, Sam looked sideways at the windshield. The head was gone. He swiveled around to look out the rear for a headless body to get up and skip merrily away. Again, there was nothing.

Sinking down in the seat, Sam pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes and dragged in a shuddering breath. "Dean?"

"Yeah?" His brother's voice sounded fragile.

"I think I'm losing my mind."

"No." Dean's denial came too quick. "No, man. It's just, you know, after everything, it's just stress and nightmares."

Sam lowered his hands. "Dean, I'm seeing things."

The Adam's apple in Dean's throat bobbed as he swallowed. "Things from Hell?"

"I guess." Sam felt his forehead crease. "Yeah, they'd have to be. Except I don't remember Hell. I'm not sure, but . . ."

Warm fingers slid onto his wrist. "They're that bad?"

Staring at Dean's hand, Sam gave a tight nod.

"Sam . . .?"

"No, Dean, I swear. I haven't picked at the wall."

A heavy exhalation lifted Dean's shoulders. "Not what I was gonna ask. I believe you."

Sam lifted his head. "You do?"

The smile Dean gave him was kind . . . and sad. "Yeah."

Sudden tears obscured Sam's vision. He blinked to push them away.

They sat in silence while several cars passed by. Usually flowing with untapped energy, Dean gazed out the window, unhurried to pull the car back onto the mountain road, giving Sam the calm to pull himself together.

"Dean?"

"Mm-hmm?"

"When, um . . . when . . ." Sam studied the key hole on the glove compartment. "Did you . . . see . . . things?"

Dean turned to look directly at him. "Every day."

"Oh." That only made him feel worse.

"Sam." Dean's hand was back again, higher on Sam's forearm this time. "It gets better."

"How did you deal with it?"

Dean shrugged. "Did my job, went hunting. And then you were a whole 'nother distraction. I had to figure out what was going on with you Ruby."

"Great. My lying and sneaky around with a demon was therapeutic for Hell PTSD."

"Hey, we take what we can get." Dean leaned forward to get his face within Sam's downcast view. "The point is, whatever this is . . .what you're seeing, even though you don't remember the Cage, and that's good, Sammy. God knows I don't want you to remember that. These things you're seeing, probably just filler. Your mind knows you were in Hell, but without any memory of it, your brain is just making things up, filling in details."

Sam stared at Dean, wanting to believe that. Could it be that simple? Just filler images. He ached for that to be true.

"So we'll hunt, Sammy. We'll keep you busy and distracted until your freak of a brain figures out there's better things to dwell on. Okay? You with me on that?"

"Yeah, okay, yeah." Sam nodded repeatedly, short jerky movements as though if he kept it up, it would make everything Dean suggested true.

And for several more hours it was. Sam felt a lightness that unclenched the constant terror from his muscles. For the rest of the drive and the hike into the mountains, even long after they pitched the tent and ate canned stew by the fire, continuing the banter over which horse was better, Silver or Scout, Hell stayed away.

Until Sam awoke in the middle of the night from a tug on his belly and a toddler, smiling as chubby hands pulled Sam's intestines out from his torn bloody stomach.

TBC


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

A sense of wrongness brought Dean out of sleep. He blinked up at the tent's pointed ceiling, getting his bearings as quiet gasps wheezed like rotating pinwheels through the quiet morning air. He turned immediately toward Sam, and found his brother shuddering, head arched back against his sleeping bag while his long hands opened and closed over his stomach like he was trying to push something away.

"Hey, hey. What is it?" Dean was crouching over Sam in an instant. "Are you hurt?" They'd camped far back from the mountain man's boundary, but you couldn't be too careful with spirits. Glancing around the tent, Dean noted that the salt circling the inside of the tent hadn't been disturbed.

Sam's arm stretched out, fumbling blindly until his palm connected with Dean's elbow and hung on. Eyes squeezed tight, the kid was coated in sweat. Had he been awake all night?

"Sam, give me something. What's going on?"

"S-stomach."

"Your stomach hurts?" Had Sam been getting sick and he had failed to notice the signs? Except this came on suddenly. The canned stew last night hadn't been that old, but Sam did have a more sensitive stomach.

"Intestines. P-pulling out my intestines."

_Damn_. Dean lifted Sam's shirt and laid his palm over the flat abdomen. "Can you feel them being pulled or just saw it?"

Eyes still scrunched tight, Sam nodded. "Feel."

_Shit_. "Sam, listen to me. It's not happening. You're fine. My hand's on your stomach. Can you feel my hand?"

A long shudder traveled through Sam. Cautiously, he moved both of his hands to cover the one Dean had on his belly.

"Is he gone?" Sam still wouldn't look.

"Is who gone?"

"The baby."

_Oh God._ Dean's throat tightened. He knew that torture technique, the surrealism of having a child cut you up and play with your insides. It was a true reality of Hell, but Sam couldn't know that, his mind couldn't fill in details like that if his memories were blocked behind a barrier. _Shit, shit, shit, shit._ Everything inside of Dean plummeted over the edge. _Shit!_ The wall wasn't holding, the memories bleeding out somehow.

He rubbed his other hand across his face. He had to pull it together. One crisis at a time. He took a deep breath. "There's no baby here, Sam. Just me. Open your eyes."

"Dean?" Sam sounded like a friggin five-year-old. He hated this.

"I promise, bro. Just me."

Sam's eyes finally cracked open. He stared at the canvas walls for a while before lifting his head to glance around, his hands still tightly holding Dean's to his flesh.

He sat up, frowning and then all at once his features crumbled. "I feel like an idiot." He looked down, released Dean's hand.

"No need for that," Dean reassured. "None of this is supposed to be easy."

Sam just nodded. "I shouldn't go on this hunt. If I'm seeing things that aren't real at a bad time, it could be dangerous."

Dean had started thinking the same thing, but he still needed to bolster Sam. "I won't let anything happen to you."

"To you, Dean. Dangerous to you. How can I have your back when I'm not even sure of what's real?"

Dean wanted to argue the point, to tell Sam it would be okay, but stopped himself. He didn't know what to think. Sam was right. Having an episode in the middle of a hunt could be disastrous, but a Sam without a purpose, without something, anything, to occupy his mind, would leave his brother with nothing else but to close himself in his own brain and stare at that wall.

It was like choosing between evil door number one and evil door number two. And Dean didn't think they could just walk away from this particular game show without one of those doors imploding and spewing gore all over them.

Sam's head was hanging again, though Dean could tell he was trying to take several little glances at Dean without him knowing it. Dean blew out a breath. He wasn't ready to give up on this. Not on helping Sam. Not if it took a lifetime. They were raised as hunters. When things didn't go as planned, they modified, came up with a Plan B, sometimes a Plan C. Point is, they never gave up. Not 'til the fugly was dead.

So this fugly was a big bad fiery piece of real estate down under. It still wasn't badass enough to take down the Winchesters.

So they'd modify. Adapt how they hunted. Let Sam do the research, keep his mind focused, maybe scout out a few jobs before the actual hunt, and then leave the confrontations to Dean. It wasn't perfect. Sam would hate being left behind out of the hunt, worrying about Dean not having backup, but even worrying was a better place for his mind to land than on the alternative, because anything was better than leaving Sam without any focus but to scratch at the wall.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Yeah. Until we get a handle on what is going on with you, taking on this mountain man probably isn't our best idea."

Head still lowered, Sam nodded. Dean knew the posture. Kid was relieved because he was scared he'd make things worse, but he was also feeling useless. "But since we're already here, I think we should still look around."

Sam did look up then, brows squished together over confused eyes.

"Just hear me out. We go in, see if we can make any sense of what's going on, maybe we'll get lucky and find the dude's remains. If we can, it's an easy salt and burn. If it's more complicated we leave and give Bobby all the information we got on it and let him call in other hunters to take care of it."

Sam's lips curved down. "So you're saying we just look around?"

Dean nodded. "That's all."

"Yeah, okay." Sam seemed to shrink in on himself and Dean's heart shriveled with him. He'd given up hunting for a year when he was with Lisa and it had been like cutting his arm off. Of course he'd been mourning Sam at the same time so what was the loss of a limb in light of that?

"Maybe you'd be better off looking around on your own." _No_. Sam was closing down on him. Dean couldn't allow that.

"I would, but I need you, man." _You have no idea how much_. "Your freaky mind sees things I miss." Dean winced, wishing he had phrased that better. "Always has. Face it, you're good at this research crap."

"Research crap?"

Dean grinned at the slight huffiness to Sam's tone. "Yeah, the boring part of a hunt."

"Boring part?" Sam's lips were twisted, his forehead furrowed tightly until his gaze settled over Dean and saw the full blown grin. It took only a second for the kid's pearly whites to make an appearance. "So you think this will work?"

"Work?" Now it was Dean's turn to question.

"Keeping my mind occupied with research to keep Hell from breaking through."

The moisture evaporated inside Dean's mouth. "See what I mean. You saw right through that." Sam only looked at him, watching. Dean sighed. "I don't know, Sammy. But it's worth a try, isn't it?"

"Yeah. Yeah. It's worth trying."

#

They'd been in the mountain man's territory for more than an hour, near the area Matt had been attacked. They hadn't found anything useful to go on, just more of the same low scrub, grainy boulders and trees.

"I think this research is a bust, man." Dean nudged a stone with the butt of his shotgun. "There's nothing here."

Crouched down over one of the hiker's prints, Sam glanced up. "Big area. We knew just stumbling upon something wouldn't be easy." Sam went back to the print, bracing his own shotgun on his knee. Just because he wasn't actually hunting, didn't mean he'd be stupid enough to go into a ghost's territory without salt rounds. According to the prints, Matt had been running.

"Got anything?" Dean crouched down beside him.

"Just Matt's trail. It'd be nice if ghosts left footprints, huh?"

Dean snorted. "Wouldn't it though."

Sam straightened. "I'm, um, just going to follow these, see if maybe something shows up when he got out of the _magic circle_." Sam grinned at that. Naming an area was just so Dean. "Maybe signs of a last struggle to grab Matt back, ya know like how ghosts attack us every time right before we toast their bones."

"Last ditch effort. Good thinking."

They began walking side by side, both tracking the footprints across the sun-dappled ground. "So, um," Dean hedged. "Has everything been good?"

Sam stopped. "Are you asking if I've had any hallucinations in the last hour?"

Dean stopped, swung around.

Sam looked down, shook his head. "No. Guess your keep-Sam's-brain-occupied plan actually works."

A smug smile lifted Dean's features. "Sure it has. Sooner you realize what a genius I am, we'll both be better off."

"Ri . . . ight." Sam grinned, then immediately lost it, seeing a figure flicker past Dean's shoulder. A Native American in full warrior's garb, loincloth over buckskin breeches. Had his brain really conjured up Tonto just because they talked about him? Except blood poured down the warrior's face, into his eyes from a half-peeled away scalp and he was shaking his fist, shaking long strands of brittle yellow hair that trailed between clenched fingers. "Um, Dean?" His voice squeaked. "Now that you mention it, I'm seeing things again."

"No, Sam, not this time. I see him too."

How bad did his life suck that he was relieved to see a real ghost instead of an illusion? "Native American?" _Please be seeing the same thing._

"Yup. Looks pretty pissed too. Did either Matt or Kevin mention something about Indians that I missed?"

"No."

"Okay, then." Dean swung up his shotgun, but before he blasted Tonto, an enraged scream came from behind them. Both hunters turned to see the mountain man, running toward them, axe swinging. Dual shots rang out as both Sam and Dean fired. Mountain man, axe, fur pelted hat and coat all disappeared in a swirl of light.

Sam looked back to find the Native American was also gone.

"Well." Dean lowered his shotgun. "That was fun. Anything you can make out of that, research guy, so we can get out of here, 'cause I got nothin."

Sam squinted his eyes at the spot the Indian had just been. If he was correct, it was just outside of the _magic circle_. "No. Maybe." He sprinted across the ground, stopped where the warrior had stood and scanned the ground, scanned the trees, searched the craggy boulders.

There. It had been right here where the Native American stood. Setting the shotgun against the rock, Sam pulled his knife from his belt, and started scraping moss off the largest boulder.

"Wanna share with the class?" Dean came up behind him.

"Look at this." Sam pulled a large swath of moss from the stone.

"Hieroglyphics?"

"Yeah. Like heavy duty shamanic glyphs. Dean, I think this is what is holding our trapper inside. There has to be several of these markings spread out around the area."

"So, what, we scratch out a few of these markings and bad guy goes poof."

Sam scraped his teeth along his bottom lip. "I don't think that's a good idea. The Shaman trapped him in here for a good reason. We shouldn't mess with that."

"How do we know their reason is a good reason?"

"We don't, but Dean, the warrior isn't the one killing people."

"Right." Dean pushed his hand back through his hair. "Good point. So where does that leave us? Still no bones to burn."

"Um?" Sam shrugged. "Post warning signs? Dean, look out!"

Sam shoved Dean out of the path of the swinging axe, caught it by the handle, coming nose-to-nose with the mountain man. Chilled breath wafted over him. Muscles straining, they held to the all too solid weapon, neither giving an inch. Sam knew if he let go now the axe-head would continue its arc into him.

"Sam!" Dean called.

Sam couldn't look, couldn't do anything but hold onto that rough handle. His arms were shaking. The mountain man grinned, showing darkened rotting teeth. Blood dripped down the sun-weathered forehead from beneath a fur cap and a little redhead girl without eyes played peek-a-boo behind the trapper's shoulder, shocking Sam so bad, he wrenched the axe and it ripped from both their grasps, flying across the Shamanic boulder and out of the magic circle.

The ghost roared. No longer with an axe, the mountain man rammed into Sam. The ground came at him in a rush.

"Sammy!" Dean was there, running between him and the enraged trapper, shotgun high. The shot exploded salt into the air, but the mountain man had blinked out, then reappeared behind Dean, tossing the gun aside and wrapping long arms around Dean's chest, crushing the life from him while a clown with no legs slithered beneath Dean's dangling feet and the girl with red hair played cat's cradle with strips of skin she scratched off her own arms.

TBC


	5. Chapter 5

**I am so thrilled with last night's Show. Even more so that this fic still fits somewhat in canon. Except for the memory thing, but it's not completely blown out of the water at any rate. Just a warning: This chapter is a little out there. **

Chapter Five

Sam didn't know what was real and what wasn't. Dean. Dean was real. Dean was in trouble and the fact that a leg-less clown was flopping beneath his brother's feet, reaching a knife up to saw through Dean's legs and take them for his own, couldn't matter because crazy mountain man was squeezing the breath from Dean's lungs. The pupils of Dean's eyes had already scrolled up into his skull from lack of oxygen, or was it because the clown had nearly severed his leg and Dean's blood sluiced down his jeans, plopping inky red globs onto the clown's waxy white make-up, merging and dripping into the soil where red and white spiders blossomed like damaged lilies and skittered aimlessly across the ground.

"Dean!" Sam lunged to his feet, sliding through the mass of spiders while the red-haired girl tilted her face toward him, worms weeping from the hollow holes where her eyes should be, spiders crawling onto her fluffed out skirt. "Dean!" Stumbling, Sam reached for him, hands closing upon . . . nothing.

Dean was gone. Mountain man was gone. Little girl. Clown. Spiders. Skimpy trees and boulders. All gone.

Where was he? Where was Dean? A snake of fear trembled through him. He stood in a dark cavernous space, too dark to make out any details other than the floor was squishy beneath his boots. Sam spun in a wide circle, stopping at the high glowy wall before him. It stretched far out beyond sight to either side and loomed vast and high, disappearing into the inky darkness above. Sam's heart beat heavily against his ribs.

This was familiar. How was this familiar? He reached out to touch its surface, cool and smooth beneath his palm, like tooth or bone. He knew this. Knew what it was. Death's wall.

"No. No." His plea echoed loudly. He'd finally lost it, slid down deep into his own consciousness, swallowed whole by his own injured mind while his brother was outside, dying at the hands of a ghost. "No," Sam sobbed. "Dean!"

A soft noise clinked beside him. Sam looked up, seeing red and white spiders crawling down the dull white wall, flowing from a small fracture in the smooth surface. Another scrape sounded. To his right, small childish hands pulled through from another fissure, the blind girl's head poked out, red curls swinging.

Sam stepped back, scanning the surface. All over the wall, there were small tears and rifts, spilling out unspeakable horrors. Dark liquid ran down the wall, warming the surface like melting ice. A woman shimmed through a crevice, arms bent at distorted angles as she dropped to the floor and scurried away like a crab. Sam knew her, he remembered, a true memory of Hell when he watched her bones stretch and break before reverting to the creature she was.

Everything he'd been seeing, the hallucinations, they hadn't been fillers his torn mind conjured, but true memories of Hell seeping out, dislodging from a crumbling wall and as he watched each ugly repulsive horror spill out, he remembered them. Remembered with such clarity that he felt himself back there, felt the razor teeth cut into his flesh, the restraints dig into his limbs as they stretched him tight, the sound of bones pulling from joints, ripping his body apart. The baby crawled to his leg, looking up at him with large innocent eyes, reaching for Sam's abdomen. Forcing his gaze away, Sam stared at the wall, knowing what had oozed out was nothing compared to what was still behind and when all of Hell finally flooded out, he'd be overcome. His mind would never survive.

The leg-less clown crawled toward him, elbows sinking in the squishy ground. Hands rose from the ground, grabbing at his jeans, jerking to pull him down.

No. No. None of this was real anymore. Just memories. Just a shitload of horrible memories. None of it was real. But Dean. Dean was real and Dean needed him, needed him to get it together like yesterday or Dean was going to die. And that would be real.

Death had been wrong. The Horseman thought he could build a wall to keep Hell from Sam's soul, but the pit was too immense, too potent and vast, too unspeakably horrifying to be locked back. A wall could never overshadow the atrocities that happened there.

Hell was a part of him now, disfiguring the layers of his mind with mutilated scar tissue. It would never go away. But he had already survived the reality of it once so he sure as shit could suck it up and wade through the residue. He was Sam Fucking Winchester and he understood now. He knew exactly what had to be done.

They say time heals everything, which was a butt load of crap. Time doesn't heal, but what was done within the time one had . . . Sam frowned. He was finished with fighting the presence of Hell. No more shying away from it. And no more trying to fix the unfixable of what his soulless self had done during his unsupervised year topside.

In Death's grandeur, in his way of looking at the wide scope, the Ancient Being had gone big, constructing a wall around the entirety, but that was wrong. Useless. The Horseman should have narrowed his focus, thought smaller.

So Sam did what Death should have realized all along. Within himself, he searched for the richness of his brother's recent laughter, visualized those damn high heel chairs and Dean's exasperated features. He followed the buzzing of that most recent happy memory past a mass of bruised screaming faces, finding it nearly buried, to disappear forever, within a mass of gore and bone. Swallowing hard, Sam plucked it out, pulling the deep rich sound from the mass where the tones vibrated in his open palms like a strand of warmest velvet. Spooling the dulcet pulses around himself, Sam cocooned his broken soul within the soothing ripples of Dean's laughter.

And Hell receded. The hands on his legs lowered, the baby slipped away. Not entirely gone, but faded somehow. Still there. Always there.

This. This was how Sam would keep Hell at bay. Instead of fruitlessly trying to right wrongs committed, he would go forward. With every new hunt, every life saved, every moment spent with Dean, whether laughing or gazing at stars or just driving into the night . . . These moments he'd gather to him and tuck his soul in tight, a soft insulating balm from the ravishments of the hopeless. And when the strands faded, as he knew they must, and Hell's claws raked through the cushion once more, he'd build up new moments, layers upon layers, a lifetime of purpose, hunting things, saving people. This would be his salvation, not cowering behind Death's writhing burning wall as it fell and crushed him, but building and rebuilding a protective lining around his soul as he walked through Hell, taking it head on.

Dean had always been his protector. Sometimes Sam was relieved by that, other times he butted against it, seeking independence, but now, for his soul, he pulled that protection to him. Let the Great Wall of Sam come down. He was ready.

And as he pulled the warmth that was his brother tighter around him, the wall and the blood and the gore faded, the world tilted and he found himself on his knees in the forest, staring into the smeared face of a startled clown in the woods . . . and his brother and the mountain man were nowhere in sight.

TBC


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Clowns. An added touch to Sam's personal Hell, courtesy of Lucifer. Sam stared down at dark triangle lined eyes. Figures any clown would be harder to get rid of. Sam pushed himself up. He didn't have time for this. Dean was in trouble. Hallucinations would just have to take a number and wait.

He ran over to the boulder with the shaman engravings, outside of the _magic circle_ and grabbed the medicine man's axe, surprised a ghost's weapon was still solid when the ghost was no longer present. It felt heavy and grainy in his hands while he studied it. He had to figure this out, had to find Dean. What if he was too late? A shudder rolled through him. No, no, focus. Dean was counting on him.

"Little Sammy Winchester." Sharp nails stabbed inside his skull at that voice. His gaze wrenched up. Across the clearing, Mrs. Fregal rolled the front legs of her walker across the bumpy ground, the back legs sinking into the soft dirt. Beetles climbed around each other within the little basket attached to the front of the metal walker. "You've been a very naughty boy, running away like that." He'd felt sorry, seeing her in Hell. She looked like anybody's grandmother, until those gnarled arthritic hands poured beetles onto his face, pushed them into his ears with a burrowing bent finger.

Shaking, Sam looked away, stared at the axe, at the tight leather bindings crossing over the handle, at the beadwork and long black hair dangling from the neck where blade met handle. There had to be something here. Maybe take the axe back within the circle, let the mountain man come for him, follow him to wherever he stashed Dean.

The walker thumped next to him. "Don't look away when I speak to you." Startled, Sam looked at Mrs. Fregal and suddenly felt the beetles sliding into his ears, felt slimy legs skitter inside his brain, laying eggs, eating matter. It tickled at first, then hurt and burned. So many bugs, so many bugs, clattering noisily within his head. Loud. Terrible.

_Deaaaan_! Dean's laughter warmed inside him, chasing the loud and terrible away.

Sam raised to his full height and glared down at the little old lady. Almost gently he told her, "You're not real."

A frown deepened her wrinkles as she dissolved into soft pedals and drifted away on the breeze.

Sam's fists squeaked around the axe handle, long fingers tangling in the dry hair. Scalps. Sam stared hard at the long black hair. The mountain man had been taking Native American scalps. Sam thought about the warrior ghost, recalling the blood running off his forehead. The shamans had trapped the mountain man here. Yet the trapper had blood coming from beneath his fur cap as well.

Sam's eyes widened, clues suddenly clicking together. Quickly he pulled the folded map of the area from his jean's back pocket. Lowering, he smoothed it out across the ground, searching for the one thing he remembered researching on the computer, but couldn't remember if he'd thought it was significant at the time to mark on the map.

Elbow-crawling, the leg-less clown pulled himself over to look at the map with him. Sam and the clown stared across the paper at each other.

Swallowing hard, Sam reached down inside himself for strength, found it bolstered by the image of his brother's young questioning eyes as he first held a clumsily-wrapped amulet. Sam cleared his throat. "You need to leave. Your time here is done."

Wide painted lips curved into an exaggerated pout. Even as the clown shook his head in denial, he broke apart, over and over, larger pieces into smaller and smaller colorful pieces until he was nothing but slivers, like straw, dropping to a pile on the ground.

Sam went back to the map, scanning all the little notes and markings he'd penciled in. There. _Thank God_, he'd marked it. Indian burial ground. Due east. Still outside the _magic circle._ Grabbing map and axe, Sam took off running.

And Hell materialized around him, misshapen rats biting at his ankles, bloody hacked-off body parts fell onto him, shaken loose by shrieking horse-head monkeys in the trees. Weeping young women, begged him to save them as their white dresses sprouted crimson tears. Sam simply outran them, gave them no heed. They weren't real. Not real. He'd never been able to save the women in Hell anyway. Monsters always dragged them off. Dean was real. Dean needed him.

He reached the burial ground. There were at least six standing scaffolds, long withered pine boughs holding tattered blanket-swathed forms. Another three scaffolds had fallen, bearing their sacred contents to the grassy soil. Sam slowed, panting, moving closer. The quiet air abruptly changed, tingling as though charged in an electrical current.

The shaman appeared in Sam's path, an aggressive stance, barring Sam's entrance within their hallowed space. Blood seeped from the warrior's head and the young women wept behind Sam's back.

Sam lifted the mountain man's axe, stretching it outward in open palms, the scalp and long black hair dangling. The shaman's dark eyes settled on the hair before tracking back to Sam's gaze. Slowly the Indian nodded.

Taking that as an acceptance to enter, Sam cautiously moved forward and the warrior blinked away. Sam moved quickly among the scaffolds, trying to figure out which one was the right one until he a saw a large piece of hide tied securely with a thong set on top of the blanket shroud—a medicine bundle. Next to it lay a wood-carved medicine pipe, tools of a shaman.

He wasn't exactly certain of the ritual or protocols of doing this, or if there even was a ritual he should be doing, so Sam simply laid the axe and scalp across the blanket beside the bundle as an offering. Then gingerly lifted the blanket, grimacing as it tore in his hands, and searched the bones nestled within. He following the stripped ulna and radius bones of the arm, unnerved by how similar the bone felt to Death's wall, let his fingers move onto the wrist, the phalanges, coming to something that felt like brittle paper clenched within the skeletal fingers.

Sam pulled it out, drawing straw-like hair with it that caught on the wrist bones, until he weaved it free and brought a yellow-haired scalp from beneath the worn blanket.

The Indian flashed next to him, causing Sam to nearly jump out of his skin. Gah. He'd just run through rats and horse-monkeys flinging body parts, but it was still a regular ghost appearing too close that startled his pulse into action.

They stared at each other, mere inches apart, until the shaman lifted his arm toward the north, back inside the circle. Sam could only hope the guy was telling him what he thought he was indicting.

"Thank you," Sam said, sincerely meaning it and without another word, took off running in that direction, the mountain man's scalp clutched tightly in his fist while gray birds swooped around him, beaks clamped around eyeballs that all turned to stare at him, trailing stringy ligaments that whipped along in their wake.

Sam ignored them until the first of the birds dived at his face, talons extended to pluck out his own eyes. Remembering the feel and the sound of his muscles and ligaments tearing away from his eye cavity, Sam flung his arm over his head and thought of Dean, lunging off the bridge, pulling himself from the river, green eyes frustrated and shiny within a mud-coated face, screaming at the woman in white for possessing his car, and pop, pop, pop, pop, the birds exploded like fireworks around Sam, spiraling in the air in bits of fluff and feathers and eyeballs that bounced along the ground.

Sam sprinted on, just knowing the direction the shaman sent him in without knowing how far or in what condition he'd find his brother, when he heard a noise. Metal scraping on stone. Sam slowed, stilled completely, listening, trying to place the sound as either another fragment of Hell or a true sound of this world. It rang again, a low rhythmic grinding, like a blade being scraped repeatedly across a sharpening stone.

_Damn_. Sam moved silently toward the sound, pushing between a tight copse of trees and around a huge boulder to come upon the mountain man, the ghost's back turned toward him while he crouched, pushing the dull blade of his knife across a stone, honing it for use since he was now without his axe. Just beyond the trapper's boots, Dean lay face down in the dirt, motionless, eyes loosely closed, unaware of the glossy black snakes twining around his legs, slithering inside his jacket, sliding through his hair.

Sam froze. Were the snakes real? Sure there had been snakes in Hell, tons of them. Small ones that wormed into every orifice, and larger snakes with fangs that brought liquid pain to every cell, leaving him writhing in agony for hours, weeks. He'd even once been swallowed whole by an anaconda to experience suffocation as he was crushed, his ribcage breaking inward to impale lungs and heart. But they were also in the mountains where the ghost could just have easily dumped Dean into a nest of real snakes.

Sam stared at Dean, looking for any fang marks and watching for the rise and fall of a breath, but couldn't make one out beneath the tangle of snakes sloping around Dean. Sam didn't know what to do. Tackle the mountain man or try and sweep the snakes off his brother without Dean getting bit?

A movement from the ghost pulled Sam out of his stupor. Setting the sharpening stone aside, the mountain man crouched over Dean, brushing snakes away from his hair. _Oh God_, they were real. Pulling Dean's head up, the ghost braced the blade at the top of Dean's forehead.

"Stop!" Sam screeched, stepping completely around the boulder, holding the scalp from the burial ground out before him.

The mountain man twisted around, eyes narrowing. His hand went to his forehead, fingers sinking beneath the fur cap where he bled. In a flash he was next to Sam, shoving him back against the boulder. Clinging tightly to the scalp, Sam's other hand slipped into his jean's pocket, searching for the lighter. _Shit, shit!_ It wasn't there. He always had a lighter!

Angry rheumy eyes bored into him and then . . . a twisted smile. Sam felt the cold tip of metal press against his stomach, slip into his flesh, pushing inward.

Eyes wide, Sam did the only thing he could. He dropped, sliding out of the ghost's grasp, felt the tip of the blade move upward, slicing along his chest, his shoulder, and away. A long horrible slash, but shallow. Better than being stabbed. Better than being stabbed. He scrambled over to Dean. Snakes or not, Sam rolled his brother, dropping hissing serpents off him, sweeping more away as he pulled Dean across the ground, watching the snakes shoot off every which way into the brush. He plunged his hand into Dean's left jean's pocket just as the ghost grabbed Sam, threw him across the clearing. Before he could pull in a breath, the trapper straddled him. The edge of the blade pushed into his forehead, splitting skin, rubbing bone.

Screaming, Sam brought his hands together between him and the mountain man. One hand held the scalp, the other Dean's lighter. Warm blood dribbled down the side of his face.

A little snick. A flame. And the mountain man roared apart within an undulating spiral of blue fire.

TBC


	7. Final Chapter

**Whew, that was close. Wanted to get this finished before the episode tonight. **

**Chapter Seven**

Dean came to with a groan in his throat. Sonofabitch, he hurt. Even before he opened his eyes, he knew he was in the back seat of the Impala. He'd know the feel of her old springs and leather anywhere. Except he wasn't quite all the way on the seat, more like just his back with his hips and legs sprawled downward out the open door. A cooling breeze blew across him. Which was just . . . weird. Last thing he remembered was the mountain man's ghost doing the huggy-bear mamba on him while little brother Sammy went off dancing with the sugar plum fairies in his own head.

Eyes snapping open, Dean sat up. "Sammy?" _Ow, ow, ow, ow._ He pulled his arms around his chest, hissing in a breath. _Damn_, that hurt. Exhaling, he took quick inventory. Nothing broken, ribs probably just bruised, hurt like a mother. "Sam!"

Scooting across the seat, Dean looked across the moonlit night. They were still in the mountains, in the same place he'd parked the car before hiking and setting up their tent the previous day. Holding onto the open door, Dean gingerly pushed to his feet, glancing down . . .

And found Sam. Lying on the ground not two feet from him, moonlight illuminating the shiny black liquid covering most of his still face.

Steel bands seemed to clamp around Dean's chest, tighter than the mountain man's hold had been. Dean dropped to his knees. "Sammy."

More blood had soaked through Sam's shirts, glossy and pooling lengthwise across the kid's torso on the side he laid on. Feeling for a pulse, the pads of his fingers sliding in the accumulation of blood on Sam's neck, it was easy for Dean to take in what had happened. The long slice across his brother's forehead and the hastily put-together travois a few steps beyond of two long saplings running inside the sleeves of both Sam's and Dean's jackets. His brother had somehow snapped himself out of his Hell-induced illusions, almost been scalped by the mountain man, somehow gotten both himself and Dean away, and dragged Dean all the way back here, nearly getting him into the back seat before he passed out.

It scared the crap out of Dean, but he also felt incredibly incredibly proud.

He sighed, finally finding a pulse. _Thank God, kiddo. _The only thing he didn't have an explanation for was the amount of blood coating Sam's shirts. Not wanting to jostle him too much until he knew what he was dealing with, Dean pulled his knife from his boot and cut Sam's T-shirt down the middle and then carefully pulled the material away from his brother's side. That band of steel tightened incrementally around Dean's ribs. A thin slice ran from Sam's shoulder to just below the side of his navel as though someone had wanted to pull back the curtains and look at his ribcage. It wasn't too deep, but damn, it was long. A significant amount of blood loss and keeping infection from settling in was probably the biggest concern. Not counting that he didn't know how long Sam had been out cold, lying in the dirt, pumping out blood he didn't have the luxury of losing. _Damnit_.

Gritting against his own pain, Dean stretched over Sam and fished his keys out of his jacket stretched between the travois poles. He hurried to the trunk and pulled out the first aid kit, grabbing a blanket that he tossed into the back seat for later and set the kit next to his brother before pulling his outer shirt off.

"Kay, Sammy. I'm gonna patch you up a bit, then we're out of here." He tipped the water bottle over his shirt, wetting the fabric and began dapping at the blood on Sam's face. "We'll stop at the first hotel we come to, get you warm in a nice bed, rested up. You'll like that, huh? Come on, Sam, you need to wake up."

Dean had most of the blood cleaned away from the slice on the kid's forehead and was holding the skin tightly together with all of their butterfly bandages on it when Sam started moving, long legs kicking at the soil, a hand lifting and falling, then lifting again toward his head. "Owww."

Dean grabbed Sam's wrist, pulled his hand down. "No touching. Your hands are dirty." _Crusted in blood._ "You with me, Sam?"

"Nmmmmph."

"Come on, gotta do better than that. Prove it to me."

Sam's face scrunched in annoyance. Dean smiled, rejoicing in every little nuance of pure unadulterated Sam emotion.

Sam's eyes slid open, settled on Dean before his forehead pulled into those horseshoe crinkles, puckering the butterfly bandages. Sam's lips curled downward. "I feel like crap and you're smiling."

"I'm smiling because I'm such an awesome doctor my bandages are holding out even against your bitchiest of expressions."

"You're an ass."

"An awesome ass." Dean started mopping at the blood on Sam's shoulder, stopping when Sam flinched. "Cold?"

Sam nodded, mouth tight. "Hurts."

"Sorry. I'll be quick." He pressed the damp shirt onto the wound again, noting how Sam's fists clenched. "You almost had the haircut of all haircuts. Wanna tell me what happened?"

Sam's eyes drifted closed. "Found the mountain man's scalp. Burned it." His head lolled to the side.

Dean taped several large squares of gauze over Sam's wound. They were stark white in the moonlight. "Little vague on details there, pal." He nudged his brother. "Sam?"

Sam's eyes wrenched open on a gasp.

"Talk to me, what else happened?"

But Sam didn't answer him. His gaze tracked to a point over Dean's shoulder. His eyes widened in fear. Dean looked behind him, saw only the gleaming chrome of the Impala.

"Go away," Sam's strangled whisper raised the fine hairs along Dean's arms.

Dean slipped his palm beneath Sam's neck to offer comfort, let him know he was there ready to help Sam fight his inner battles with him, but something else happened. Sam's features relaxed, a slight smile curved his lips.

Dean narrowed his eyes, wondering what was going on now. "You seein something?"

Sam's gaze ticked back to his, held. "Was. Gone now."

Dean didn't know what to make of that, but if the peace settling onto his brother's features was any indication, it was a good thing.

"Okay, Sasquatch. Let's get you into the car." He pulled Sam to a sitting position, pausing while the kid's torso clenched tight and waited for Sam to breathe through it, Dean's arms around him, ready to lift. "So the mountain man's gone?"

"Yeah." Sam's voice was pitched high and tight with pain.

"Good, 'cause I don't really want to deal with him." He shuddered theatrically. "What if he would've gone for my hair."

"Uh—um."

Now Dean flinched. "He went to scalp me?"

Sam shrugged within Dean's grip.

"Holy crap." A mental picture of himself with a scarred bald head made his stomach roll and clench. Shaking if off, he hauled Sam laboriously to his feet, guiding his brother the few steps to the back seat.

"Left the tent, all our supplies." Sam sat heavily on the seat, legs still outside, leaning his blood-caked head against the metal edge of the open door.

"Screw the tent." Dean reached beyond Sam and unfurled the blanket, spreading it across the seat. Well, except his favorite rifle was still out there and a bunch of supplies in the duffle. He'd come back for their stuff in a day or so while Sam was on the mend at the closest motel, which made him stop short at the thought, that he'd consider going someplace that was more than a few hours away from Sam and out of cell range.

He thought about that as he helped him lower to lie across the seat, pulled the rest of the blanket up around him, then went to get their jackets off the saplings and put the first aid kit back in the trunk. Something had changed within Sam, something significant. He didn't know what it was, but Dean knew his brother, knew every expression, and he knew that somehow, in some crazy Sam way, his sibling was beating Hell.

#

Sam stared at the little mom and pop gas station. After several days of rest, it had seemed important to come here, to try once again to make amends to the father who owned the place. He was ready for that, ready to face him, to beg forgiveness for allowing his wife to believe she could turn their daughter back when he'd really only used her as bait to draw the werewolf in.

But now that he was here, he wasn't sure this was what the father needed. Sure it would ease Sam's conscience, but was that really the point anymore? How would him showing up out of the blue, seeking forgiveness, help the man inside?

"Sure you don't want me to come with?" Dean startled him out of his musings.

Sam turned back toward his brother. "Actually." He scraped his teeth over his lower lip. "I'm not sure this is the best thing." He tilted his head toward the gas station. "For him."

To his credit, Dean didn't react, didn't point out that they'd come all this way. He simply nodded and Sam nearly wept at the infinite well of his brother's patience with him.

"I mean I can't bring his wife and daughter back. I can't make that right for him. All I'd be doing is bringing back bad memories to the surface, making things worse."

"You sure? You'll be okay with walking away?"

Sam glanced back over his shoulder. "Yeah." His gaze swung back to the car where a flock of vultures tore bits of flesh away from the bloated body slumped across the Impala's roof. A sharp beak lifted, long neck arched to gulp down a rotting hand.

"Sam." Dean's palms curled onto his shoulders, earnest face looking into his. "You seeing something?"

Sam nodded. "A dead guy. Vultures."

Dean cursed. "I hated that one. And then when the vultures turned on me . . . ggga." He shuddered.

Sam looked away from the grisly scene to stare at Dean. "That happened to you too?"

"Guess they can't always come up with original stuff on the fly."

Sam didn't like that Dean had gone through something like that, but in a messed-up sort of way, it also helped that they had that in common and his brother came through the other side and was able to joke about it.

"The point is . . ." Dean's hands curled tighter. "I've been there, bro. Whatever you see, any time you're seeing it, we can talk about it."

His throat closing, Sam nodded.

"Okay?"

"Yeah."

"That's my boy. I'm just . . ." Dean swallowed, visibly pulling himself together. "I'd give anything for you not to have to go through this, not to have these visions pop up all the time."

"No, it's good. Because when I see one or three or ten at a time, those are ten that have gotten beyond the wall. And that's good."

"How is that good?"

"Because I can deal with them in small doses. It's when the entire wall finally crashes that worries me."

Dean's hand slid down to Sam's wrist. "That's when we'll deal with it together."

Sam looked at his brother, knowing that Dean couldn't possibly know how much that was true. He was only able to deal with any of these memories of Hell because of the memories he had of Dean.

"Hey!" The door to the little gas station slammed open, banging against the outside wall. "You! You . . . should never have come here! I swore if I ever saw your face again . . ." All rage and emotion the father charged across the asphalt, tears burrowing into the weather-beaten features.

Instinctively Dean moved in front of his brother, but Sam shifted to the side, needing to face this on his own, and the man rammed into him, shoving him to the ground, toppling over with him. "You killed them, you killed them, you killed them!" Wailing, the man punched him, slapping wildly, with no real skill, but with a ferocity edged in hysteria. Sam didn't even try to curl in on himself, but opened himself to each jab, each punch, unable to keep from crying out as the gash running down his chest reopened.

"Hey, hey, enough!" Dean was hauling the guy off him, though the fellow thrashed, sobbing, clawing to get back at Sam. "That's it, man! Lay off or I will put you down."

"You think I care?" the father screamed hoarsely, fighting so hard he and Dean went down in a tangle on top of Sam. "This thing killed my family!"

"No, he didn't!" Dean roared, getting the man's elbows up behind his head.

"Dean, let him go," Sam begged, tears wetting his face. "If this is what he needs . . ."

"Nobody needs this. I sure as hell don't need this. Not gonna watch you get a beatdown over something you had no control of. And you . . ." Dean flipped the guy down to his back, got right up into his face. "I know what went down with your family. Your girl was dead the minute she was bitten by a werewolf. Nothing my brother here did was going to change that."

Sam clamped down on his heart at hearing it so bluntly stated. The man stilled in Dean's grip. If possible, his lips trembled more. "But my wife . . ."

Dean faltered. Sam stared at him, afraid to breathe at what Dean might say.

His brother's face hardened. "There is no way to change a person back from being a werewolf." Dean looked at Sam. "Believe me, we know."

The man started shaking. "But he said . . ."

"I know. He was wrong." Dean eased his grip, letting the man sit up. "Look. My brother . . . he wasn't himself. He . . . he was sick . . . in the head. He's better now."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better? He let my wife believe she could save our Jenny and our little girl ripped her heart out."

Sam squeezed his eyes closed. He'd let the woman believe she could do something when he should have said something, but he'd thought he could kill the werewolf without the wife throwing herself in the way. It was a gross miscalculation. He'd still killed the wolf though and then left, not caring about the casualty. He remembered it clear as day, yet couldn't comprehend how he had ever thought those things.

"I am so sorry." Sam's voice was quiet. He opened his eyes to face the gas station owner's condemnation.

The man jerked. "Nothing could have saved my Jenny?"

Sam shook his head.

The man's Adam's apple bobbed. He raised a shaky hand to his chin, eyes filling with more tears. "I . . ." He swallowed hard. "I often wondered . . . if maybe I had believed my wife . . . or stopped her. She wouldn't listen to me, was hell-bent on getting Jenny back. She wouldn't have ever given up." His voice broke. "Why did you come here?"

Tears streamed down Sam's face. "I shouldn't have. I'm sorry."

"I told you," Dean said. "He wasn't himself, but now that he's better, he just wanted to set things right."

To Sam's astonishment, the man nodded. "So now I know."

Sam shrank back into himself. "I won't bother you again."

"Good." The man rolled to his feet even as Dean kept a wary eye on him to lash out again. The guy took a few steps away before stopping. He didn't turn back to face them, but his voice carried to them just the same. "Knowing this, it doesn't make it better."

Sam hung his head.

"But it will make it bearable."

Sam looked at the man's retreating back, then up at Dean.

Dean's smile was sad, but full of acceptance and understanding. "Come on, big guy. I think that's enough for the day. Let's get out of here." And Sam felt strong arms wrap around him, lifting, always supporting, always there for him.

#

Dean took a sideways glance at Sam in the passenger seat. The kid's chest was bleeding, some of the stitches most likely broken during the three-way brawl on the asphalt, but he hadn't wanted to remain at the gas-station any longer to look at them when the motel wasn't that far away. Sam stared at his hands in his lap, deep in his thoughts.

"You okay?"

Shiny eyes looked over at him. Those crazy forehead crinkles showed up again. "Actually, I think I am. That . . . was tough. Really tough. But you were there with me." He pressed his lips together for a moment while he gathered his thoughts. Dean didn't press him, just let Sam say whatever it was he was trying to say. "I feel, I don't know. Lighter somehow?"

And damn if Dean didn't feel a lightness suddenly spread through his own chest as well.

"Dean? Can you pull over?"

And so much for that feeling. Kid was going to be sick. Should have seen that coming. Dean pulled off onto the shoulder.

"I need to get something out of the trunk." Sam quickly climbed out of the car.

Oh. That wasn't what he'd expected. Curious, Dean followed his brother to the back of the Chevy, brows raising as Sam reached far back inside the trunk, moving salt canisters and propane tanks out of the way and pulled out a clumsily folded taped newspaper package.

Sam stared at it, shifting his weight onto his heels nervously. "I, um, have had this for a while. Was waiting for the right time."

"The right time for what?"

Sam's eyes lifted to meet Dean's, fear and apology collecting in the liquid depths. "Dean, I remember letting that vampire turn you. I remember the whole thing, what I was thinking when I let it happen." His breathing hitched up. "I can't ask you to forgive me, not for that, never for that, but I need you to know, I am so so sorry."

Dean's first inclination was to step back, get away. This was the conversation he had wanted to set things right, but it was also frightening. He wanted to run from it, pretend none of it had ever happened. But he couldn't move back, couldn't retreat from his brother anymore than he could have left his soul suffering in Hell. This was just another part of it they'd have to deal with, so Dean moved closer, cupped Sam's face between his palms. "You don't ever ask me to forgive you for that, never."

Sam's gaze strayed away. He nodded tightly.

"Because it's always been given."

Sam's eyes ticked back. A tear slid onto his cheek.

Dean slipped a palm onto Sam's shoulder, squeezing, making sure the message was delivered because he never wanted to repeat this conversation. Never.

Sam's smile was tentative, his eyes so full of love and hope if Dean looked into them anymore he was going to lose every fraction of his sloppy composure, which would certainly serve the kid right for messing with his big brother emotions on a continual basis.

"Now tell me what you have in that funky wrapped package."

Sam pressed the newspaper into Dean's hands. "It's, um, a sort of apology . . . for you know . . . everything . . . It's not much, but here. Take this. I want you to have it."

Dean's fingers closed around it. "You got me a sorry-for-getting-you-turned-into-a-vamp present?"

Sam shrugged self-consciously.

"You sure?"

"I'm sure."

Dean tore through the paper, letting out a silent gasp at what he found nestled within. Twining his fingers around a black cord, Dean lifted the little gold head and cradled it in his palm. It wasn't exactly the same as the other one, the weight and feel was different, but it was close.

"I had it specially made, had to draw the picture from memory for the smelter. It's not exact and I know it can't replace the other one, but I was hoping . . . maybe it could mean something too." Sam's lips twisted. This was important. This was Sam's way of trying to make things right with him, trying to rebuild. This wasn't a symbol of their past alone, but an added promise of their future, a new step toward unconditional trust and nothing on earth, Hell, or Heaven could make Dean not give his sibling—his Sammy—the acceptance the kid was reaching out to him for. He slipped the cord over his head, felt the new weight settle over his heart.

"Thank you, Sam. I . . . I love it."

_FIN_


End file.
